


Sunscreen and Sunshine

by iwillpaintasongforlou



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Happy birthday Erica!, Lifeguard Harry, M/M, Oneshot, liam is grumpy and captain of this ship, lifeguard louis, niall is annoying and cute, really stupid fluffy fluff intended to make the birthday girl smile, zayn is a silent but hot character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-20
Updated: 2014-06-20
Packaged: 2018-02-05 10:06:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,240
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1814632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iwillpaintasongforlou/pseuds/iwillpaintasongforlou
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry has known fellow lifeguard Louis Tomlinson for about 365 days and loved him for about 364. Zayn lounges around on the pool deck soaking up the sun and most of Louis' attention. Niall splashes about in his floaties advising Harry on how to win the man of his dreams. Liam just wishes the lifeguards at his pool would quit daydreaming and do their goddamn jobs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sunscreen and Sunshine

**Author's Note:**

  * For [EponineTheStrange (gallifreyandglowclouds)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gallifreyandglowclouds/gifts).



Harry’s summer was being ruined by that goddamn gorgeous Zayn Malik- _again._

This was his second time working as a lifeguard at the pool for the summer, and just like last year, that stunning boy was waltzing in at ten in the morning every morning, shedding most of his clothes, and lying out half-naked in the sun to tan those tattooed arms and perfectly angled cheekbones. He’d stay there for four hours, reading and listening to music and fucking ruining _everything_ until he gathered his stuff and waltzed back out even more tan and attractive than he’d been at the start of the day.

Normally it wouldn’t be a huge deal- I mean, what gay seventeen year-old guy working the world’s most boring lifeguard job wouldn’t enjoy a hot patron regularly undressing and laying across the pool from him for almost his entire shift?

But the thing was, there was a certain nineteen year-old lifeguard that would never look Harry’s way while Zayn fucking Malik was here, and that just messed it all up.

Harry met Louis when they started working this job together about a year ago. Harry has loved Louis for about 364 days. He was funny and smart and handsome and charming and tan and every time he looked across the pool to smile at Harry, he felt like he was going to float off his guard tower and drift into the sun.

He daydreamed about kissing Louis all the time, envisioned him jumping down from his tower and making his way around the shallow end to Harry and grabbing him by the back of the neck and pulling him into a kiss that tasted like sunscreen and sunshine.

It wasn’t Harry who got visits from Louis when they went on break, though. It was Zayn fucking Malik whom Louis approached, whom he sat down next to and chatted with for ten minutes, all bright smiles and quiet laughter.

“You know, Harry, if you let the swimmer you’re teaching to swim drown, you’re really not doing your job as a lifeguard,” Liam said slyly on his way back to the office.

Harry jerked his eyes away from watching Louis and Zayn laugh about something he couldn’t hear to look up at his manager. “Huh?”

“That guy’s taking on water. Pay attention!”

“I’m fine,” Niall spluttered from Harry’s arms, where he was diligently trying to learn to float on his own. “I only swallowed a few mouthfuls, I feel fine!”

Harry blushes and turns him upright anyway. “Umm, that’s it for now,” he says sheepishly. “We’ll work on it next break. Here’s your floaties back.”

Niall pulls them on without protest and treads water for a minute beneath Harry’s chair until Harry is seated atop it once more. “Are you okay, Haz?”

The curly- haired teen gazes down at his would-be victim (who also happens to be his best mate of ten years) with a carefully neutral expression. “What are you talking about? Of course I’m okay. I’m fine. I’m more than fine. I’m finery. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Because you almost let me drown while staring mournfully at Louis again. And because you just called yourself finery.”

There was no getting anything past Niall. As ridiculous as he looked with child’s floaties around his biceps, he wasn’t stupid and he certainly knew Harry better than anyone else. Harry sighed in defeat. “Dunno why I keep letting it bother me. Of _course_ he’s over there talking to Zayn. Look at the guy, he looks like he ought to have a statue made of him.”

Liam chucks a beach ball at Louis’ head through the office window to signal him to get back to work, and as Louis retakes his position on the chair and blows the whistle to summon the swimmers back, he takes a second to spare a grin and a wink for his coworker across the way. It isn’t the sun that’s making Harry melt.

“You need to put yourself out there,” Niall offers sagely from below. “I’m sure Lewis -whatever!- would be interested in you if you made it a point to catch his attention.”

Harry got yelled at later by Liam for throwing life rings at the patrons, but desperate times call for desperate measures. Niall was an annoying twat. He was also right.

Phase one of the plan Niall drafted for him that night involved showing himself off. “Clichés happen over and over again for a reason, Harry!” the mastermind had defended. “People keep doing them because they _work.”_

Which is how Harry found himself climbing out of the water and flipping his hair back like an episode of Baywatch the next day when Louis walked by. He imagined he probably looked ethereal, all glistening with water and shining in the sunlight.

Louis wiped a fleck of chlorinated water from his cheek where Harry’s hair had splattered him. “You might want to dry out your whistle,” was all he said to Harry. “You forgot to take it off before you went in.”

“You look like a drowned cat,” Niall whispered when Louis walked away, just before Harry tried to drown him, too.

Phase two was actually Harry’s idea. Niall hadn’t been so sure about it, but Harry had absolutely insisted that this was the key to it all. “He obviously likes guys who lay out in the sun with no shirt on. Maybe I just have to put in a little effort to become his type, that’s all.”

“You realize this is exactly like the end of Grease, right?” Niall continued to argue when they arrived half an hour early for Harry’s shift so that he could lay out and set the scene.

Harry rolled his eyes behind his sunglasses and shifted around on the pool chair to try to get comfortable while still looking attractive. “Sandy and Danny got together in the end, Niall. That’s sort of what I’m going for here.”

“Yeah, because Sandy completely changed herself so that Danny would like her!”

“Details. Shh! Go away, Louis will be here soon. This is going to work, okay?”

And against all odds, it (sort of) did. Harry was determinedly keeping his eyes shut, but he couldn’t help but notice when a shadow fell across him. The shadow, as it turned out, belonged to the love of his life.

“Hey, Harry,” Louis said cheerily. “Regular work hours not enough of this place for your liking?”

“Oh, you know, I just like to do some tanning sometimes,” Harry replied as smoothly as you can when your heart is pounding like that. “Feels good to lay out in the sun.”

“Yeah, yeah, definitely. Hey, is that permanent?”

Louis was gesturing to the simple star tattoo that Harry had on the underside of his left arm. “Oh, yeah,” Harry said sheepishly. “I got it for myself as a Christmas present. A friend of mine did it.”

“That’s really sick, I like it,” Louis smiled, then continued on his way.

Niall gave him two big thumbs up from the pool. Harry wished he somehow had more than two to flash in return.

They rallied later in the handicap stall of the men’s bathroom to discuss Harry’s next move. “I can’t believe he actually said my tattoo was sick,” he was still whispering excitedly. “It’s just a dumb star, but he actually _likes_ it!”

“He likes _you,_ idiot, retorted Niall.

“Oh, stop. You don’t know that’s true.”

“And you don’t know it’s not! Why don’t you just ask him?” He cuts off Harry’s protests before they can even come out. “Look, there’s only one way to find out. You know that. I know that. So just stop being a wimp and ask!”

It’s a terrible idea- Harry knows this because Niall suggested it and Niall always has terrible ideas- but he can’t think of a better one. So he twiddles his thumbs for the rest of his shift, waits until Liam goes out to check the chlorine levels, and snags Louis as he walks by and pulls him into the office.

“Wh- oh, hey Harry. What’s up?”

Harry tried desperately to get his tongue to work around the sudden dryness of his mouth. “Louis! Hey. Sorry, didn’t mean to grab you. Just, uh, wanted to chat.”

“Yeah, no worries,” Louis said cheerily, peering suspiciously at him. “Been a bit since we’ve talked. How’s life?”

“Good. Um. Yours?” _Brilliant, Harry. Way to charm his socks off._

“Not bad, yeah. Cool to have a job where I can be out in the sun, you know?”

The conversation stalled, probably because Harry was a massive idiot and this was the single most awkward exchange he’d ever had with anyone, ever. He still tried to think of something clever to say. “Um. How’s your boyfriend over there? You seem pretty cozy with him.” _Wait- FUCK._

Louis’ eyes went wide with surprise. “My boyfriend? Who- Zayn?” He threw his head back and laughed uproariously. “No, no, Zayn’s my best mate. We’ve known each other since we were in diapers. He’s not even gay.”

“Oh,” Harry said intelligently. “Oh.”

“Yeah, he’s got this bloody awful girlfriend, Tabitha, so he comes here every day so he can have some time alone without her breathing down his neck. Poor lad.”

Harry’s face is red-hot with mixed embarrassment and pleasure. _He doesn’t have a thing for Zayn fucking Malik!_ “Sorry, I just assumed- because you were always over there talking to him-“

“No worries. But nah, he’s just hanging out here because he has nowhere better to go. Plus,” Louis added hesitantly, eyes suddenly glued to his flip-flops, “if he’s here he can give me advice on how to talk to this guy I sort of have a crush on.”

Just like that, all of Harry’s pleasure is gone. Of course Louis has a romantic interest. He wasn’t going to get _that_ lucky, to have Louis be uninterested in the gorgeous man three feet away _and_ unattached. No deity was going to smile on Harry like that.

But he swallowed his disappointment and smiled a small smile. “Right. Cool. Well I’ll let you go, didn’t mean to bother you.”

“You didn’t,” Louis answered quickly. “Anytime. We should, uh, talk more. Sometime.”

“Definitely! Yup.”

“Yeah, okay. So I’ll, uh, see you tomorrow, Harry.” Louis backed towards the door.

Harry waved with as much cheerfulness as he could muster. “Bye, Louis.”

“Oh this is just bloody ridiculous,” Liam said from the doorway, making both of the lads jump. “Are you both that daft?”

“What? I have no idea what you’re talking about, Liam,” retorted Louis in a tone that sounded very much like he meant to say _shut the fuck up, Liam._

Liam paid him no mind, turning instead to Harry. “You can stop pining now. We’re one week into summer and already I can’t take it anymore.”

“Pining? I’m not- I don’t-“

“It’s you, Harry,” Liam sighed. “You’re the guy that Louis has a crush on.”

Harry’s eyes pop wide open as Louis’ flutter closed in defeat. “You’re such a fucking asshole, Liam, you _swore_ you wouldn’t say anything-“

“Yeah, well, Harry’s so distracted that people keep almost drowning, so. I’m doing a public service. Harry, do you know what Louis said to me when I called to ask him if he’d lifeguard again this summer?” Liam refused to let the younger boy drop his gaze, staring him down with determination.

“N-no?”

“He told me, ‘Only if Harry Styles is going to.’”

Louis hung his head with a face flushed beet red. “Liam…”

“Stop whining, Louis. You know what Harry said to me when I asked him what hours he wanted to work? ‘Whatever hours Louis is working,’ he told me. That was literally his only request.”

Finally, painfully, Harry and Louis worked up the nerve to look at each other. Both were blushing and nervous and hopeful right down to their toes when their eyes met. “Is that true?” Louis murmured at last.

Liam rolled his eyes with a put-upon sigh and moved to flick through some papers on his desk. “Of course it’s true, I wouldn’t make that shit up,” he retorted as he started scribbling something on a pair of sticky notes, which he then proceeded to hand to each of them. Harry looked down to find Louis’ name and a string of numbers beneath it in tidy print.

“Now,” Liam continued undisturbed, “here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to take each other’s phone number, put it in your phone, and you’re going to call each other. You’re going to go on a date and you’re going to look at each other with googly eyes and maybe snog in the bathroom, I don’t know. I don’t really care, as long as I get my goddamn lifeguards back instead of you distracted, daydreaming lot!”

And with that, Liam gave one final exasperated sigh, picked up his bag, and left the office without another word.

“What… what just happened?” Harry said numbly in the silence left in Liam’s wake. “Did he just-“

“Well I can’t be sure,” Louis said with amusement sparkling in his eyes as he offered a hand to Harry, “but I think he just demonstrated why he’s in charge and not us knuckleheads.”

Harry really couldn’t disagree, so he just took Louis’ hand and let himself be led from the office. That was a lot more satisfying than denying the truth anyways.

**Author's Note:**

> Sometimes you just need to write about cute boys being cute. No regrets, no apologies! Hope you enjoyed :)
> 
> canonlarry | tumblr


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